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,^CES AND co^ 

I A FOOL ABOUT TOWN. I 

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;ft EDITED BY HIMSELF, (^ 

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:iii (15) 

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i:|j D. K. OSBOURN & CO., BALTIMORE, MD. (|) 

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f 1876. ^ 






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A FOOL ABOUT TOWN 



EDITED BY HIMSELF. 

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BALTIMORE, Md. 
187 6. 



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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 18T<i by 

D. K. OsBouuN & Co., in the Office of the Librarian 

of Congress, at Washington. D. C. 






^^.^^t^lSCES AND COM^^^^^ 



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A fi 



OF 



AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL. 

^\ T birth, 'tis said, it was a question vvliether 
:^ My first cry would not be my last on earth ; 
And 'twas a question whether altogether 
'Twas wise to save a life so little worth. 

And as my infancy progressed, and I 

Began to smile, 'twas questioned yet again ; 

For on my face a constant siuile did lie: 

Yes, even in tears I smiled with might and main. 

Friends asked my parents ; parents asked their friends ; 

Friends asked each other; father asked my mother; 
All asked the doctor, who so deftly sends 

Life back to us, or speeds us to another. 

The doctor asked his cane-head and the wall. 
The death's-head in his office, shook his own ; 

Eyed me askance, and noted well my bawl ; 

And when his massive nose he twice had bh)wn, 
He spoke as follows, in a solemn tone: 



AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL. 



"I doubt, and yet believe. The case, as shown, 
Were doubtful to much wiser, better men. 

Have you observed" — to mother — "now and then 
A look as if he tlioiight, as if he saio 'i 
And does his cry sound always like a caw ?" 
My mother questioned all my mundane past: 
A "no" to that, a "yes" to this she cast. 

— " Here I, raging, shrieking, tore 



"If so, well — 
That coming judgment into shreds; which bore 
The doctor called one, and could say no more; 
For I, persistent and endowed with strength. 
Made it sheer wisdom to forego at length. 

Folks questioned still, and would not be content, 

Till they perforce my inmost being bent 

Into a living question mark, alas! 

And when, through all the doubts, it came to pass 

That beard broke out, and treble changed to bass, 

And I came forth to meet men face to face, 

I took to asking of the things I saw, 

And my bland smile became, at times, haw-haw I 



THE OIs^E-HORSE GROCERY STORE. 



11. 

THE ONE-HORSE GROCERY STORE. 

NE day it rained — a hail-and -water pelter — 
i^And drove me from the pavement, helter-skelter, 
Into a fragrant grocery on the corner, 
Where I sat down, some wet, and much forlorner ; 

For I despise pursuits where one pursues 
A helpless penny in another's pocket, 

And early learns to lie to him who jews. 

And always has some low trick on the docket. 

I sat forlorn upon a box of soap. 

And asked that man, whose gaze was but a stare. 
For well he knew that I ere long would slope. 

Nor leave one nickel cent of tribute there : — 

I asked him if he e'er a garden kept. 

"Well, no," he said ; moreover, hoped he needn't. 
"It seems," I said, "you water toelU^ He stept 

Aside, as if to dodge the blow, but didn't! 



THE ONE-HORSE GROCERY STORE. 



*'It seems," I also said, "you hide beneath 

Fresh, hiring things the rotten of the stock." — 

The blade once drawn, I threw away the sheath, 
Prepared for any kind of battle shock. 

"Folks needn't eat 'em," he saw fit to say. 

"Folks sliouldnHpay'' "They donH for all they get. 
They buy the good, tlieiad I give aiuay : 

I never sold a rotten thing as yet." 

'Twas then I felt a fire within me burn — 

A righteous flame that scorched and shone alike, — 

I felt my cheeks to purple roses turn ; 

My round right fist was quite prepared to strike ! 

"You send home rancid butter without pay? 

Still living cheese 2i^ presents leaves your shop ? 
Meat fit for burial goes the self-same way ? 

And milk for fresh that yet will scarcely drop ? 

"Delightful kindness that must use such shifts ! 

I pity you; but them I pity more 
Who have to smell and taste those wondrous gifts. — 

How they must love a one-horse grocery store! 

"What right have you," he cried, with tones severe, 
To talk like this outside your nursery f^ 

"/ am no infant. Eight ? All's wrong that's here. 
Where to your hand you think each purse is free !" 

He laughed a pretty little scornful laugh, 
And then began to swear, and swore away ! 

At last, he called me a ferocious calf. 

And asked me how much milk I sucked a day. 



THE OXE-HORSE GROCERY STORE. 5 | 



A sample turnip seemed now in my throat, 
And in my head a mighty busy hive. 

I wished myself a vigorous, well-fed goat, 
And him in situ angle 45° 

I told him so, and told him what I'd do. 

And how he'd look and feel when it was done. 

I told him more that I believed was true ; 
Then closed abruptly; but I did not run! 



THE LAWYER. 



III. 
THE LAWYER. 

If LIE about, or firmly walk through life: 
f^ I never run — far be the sneaking thought! 
As I go in, so I go out of strife: 
Fni never chased, though I am sometimes caught. 

My father once, like other fathers proud 
Who read their many titles clear on earth, 

When thoughts of me his manly spirit bowed, 
AVhen for no calling I showed special w^orth, 

Decreed me to the law, against my will ; 

For I despised all lawyers under heaven. 
From human braw^ls my greedy purse to fill ; 

Scour heaven and earth to prove a dozen eleven ; 

Fan flames that should be quenched — as blow-pipes fan 
Make mere dislikes to life-long hates, and glow 

With feigned emotion, placing under ban 
The truth itself, a rogue a Saint to show : — 



THE LAWYER. 



Tliese I would rather steal than do, I said ; 

But father laughed, and led me to my doom. 
For two long years my gagging spirit fed 

On ancient books, in deep and hapless gloom. 

The dismal ogre who w^atched o'er me there 
Once had a human moment, and we talked. 

My miud was wrought, and in a mild despair 
His mental black-board I with questions chalked. 

"If you were dead," said I, "what would you do?" 
"Do nothing self; my partner'd have the place." 

"I mean, where would you go, in the life that's new ?" 
"But to the grave, where all must close the race." 

"Yet you will live when dead?" I pressed it home. 

"Aly name will live ; yes, that I hope, young man." 
"And you yourself will live, in th'world to come." 

"0, the world to come. — I'll do it if I can." 

Thus he evaded; yet I did not rest : 

"Do you believe a hap))y life awaits you ?" 

"Provided, as "foresaid, I've done my best." 

"Suppose you met there every one that hates you ; 

Met weeping widows, shorn of their estates ; 

Met orphans starved below to fill your purse." 
"The widows I w^ould put on parish rates; 

The hungry orphans I'd put out to nurse." 

"Suppose the lies you've told, all written plain, 
Tlie many oaths you've made men take to them. 

Bound in a book, came back to you again." — 

"To those? — to those? Well, I should say. Ahem!" 



THE LAWYER. 



"And if you had to eat your mocking words, 
And sip the tears you've shed to save a rogue,'" 

"You're figurative, my son, and deal in surds: 
I hope such diet nowhere'll be in vogue." 

"Can any lawyer be a man ?" said I. 

"Can he be honest, pitying, pure and good ? 
That when, in ripe old age, he comes to die,- 



"He'd surely perish young, from want of food." 

This was too much. I left the musty den, 
And ne'er returned, to be a moonshine there. 

I pass it in my rambles, now and then. 

And hold my purse while giving it a stare. 

The breed must live and practice well its powers, 
While men will try to cut each other's throats ; 

They'll shed less blood by several scores of showers.. 
'Tis well, besides, to save the scattering groats. 

We must, you say, pluck out the beams from ours. 
Before we seek in others' eyes the motes. 

In case we can, 'tis true we ought, I grant; 
But, then, suppose with best intent we can't ? 



THE MODERN POLYHYMNIA. 



IV. 

THE MODERN POLYHYMNIA. 

^ASS bull-frogs solos sing, and lonely owls 
sf Make solemn cadence in the gloomy night. 
The hawk, the eagle, and domestic fowls 

Have all the gift, and each one loves to try it. 

The Katy-did, and birds of every feather ; 

The tireless tree-toad, and the ceaseless cricket; 
The locust, most inspired in sultry weather ; 

The pronged mosquito, wondering where to stick it : 

All footed nature hath a singing tool, 
And useth it as seemeth fit and proper. 

'Tis man alone that needs his voice to ^school,' — 
Too often schooling gold to glaring copper. 

To train is well, yet not to train the training. 

Expression, pruned and guided, helps us all ; 
But to express expression, as the straining 

To perch on high, high "c," then quavering fall ; 



10 THE MODERN POLYHYMNIA. 

To SOU lid the bull-frog depths beneath the "c," 
Or wildly pant, in well-feigned, dire distress, 

Or draw a note to fine tenuity, 
Till lost, as echo in a wilderness; 

To 'rocket' up, exploding in the sky, 

Or richochet afar with inany-a bound, 
Or rise as hawks tl^eir circling courses fly, 

With wilder shriek at e\ery upward round : 

These are not music, friends, w^hat e'er you say. 

They lack the tone — the very soul of song. 
You've heard the patient beast at sunset bray; 

You've heard saw-filing — heard the rousing gong: 

Witli endless uiet!K)d, your effect's the same, 
Or worse, as to pervert is always worse. 

'Tis music, surely, only in the nanie: 
All else about it is a noisy curse. 

I lieai-d a prima donna once, ah, me! 

I've had the toothache — most unwelcome rover!— 
The iatter's one thorn to a whole tliorn-tree: 

This ])ricked in one spot, t'other pricked all over! 

She sang "Sweet Home" — 0, how I wished me there ! 

The singer's throat, and not her heart, was wrought, 
She ])ealed, but not appealed ; she filled the air. 

Yet tore the air she sang to utter naught! 

She sang a Scliubert — (when will Schubert die?) — 
And such an effort strains the mind to grasp; 

Slie trilled on "c'% and burst into the sky. 
And came to earth a mute, inglorious gasp. 



THE :yiODERX POLYHYMNIA. H 



She summoned force, and howled a fearful howl— 
How perfect practice makes!— then round the conier 

She horror-stricken tore, as cheek by joAvI 
A fiend would be with her, and she a 'goner'! 

Escaped from that, she rose in a balloon, 

And for a time was nearly out of sight. 
Orchestral ropes did hold her down, and soon 

She swooped, and took a clipped-winged goose's fligjit. 

And tlien with demi-semi-quavering quiver, 
^^ She spread herself into a sparkling lake. ' 
'Twas pretty, and applause we all did give her. 

Because she sank, and closed the long-drawn ^^hake/ 
Yet ])i'ima donnas may be borne, as we 
^ ^ Put up with storms that make a fine sensation. 
'I'iiey are sporadic— charge a weakening fee- 
Are not inflicted without provocation. 

The chronic form— the fervent amateur— 

The clumsy imitator here and there,— 
The music ripper, tearer, slasher, hewer— 

'Tis he, 'tis she, 'tis it I cannot bear. 



12 THE DOCTOR. 



V. 

THE DOCTOR. 

^HE point of death I've found a pointless thing. 
-^ When I was there — as once I was, alas! — 
'Twas blister-plasters only had a sting : 

The rest was quite occult, like weak blue-mass. 

Some weeping and some sighing then were done; 

Some noses blown, and scattered words breathed out: 
"Sweet boy," "poor child," "dear Jimmie," "0, my son!" — 

As if they came through an obstructed spont^— 

Ignoring wholly wisdom-teetli and beard, 
Those signatures of Nature, vouching clear 

That manhood, proud and comely, hath appeared : 
'Twas this that pumped my only pearly tear. 

Death was my bed-mate, or 'twas that I dreamed, 
And made me cold and clammy, like lumself ; 

Then left me, sneering, just as if he deemed 
Me laid enouo;li already on the shelf. 



THE DOCTOR. 13 i 



I calmly slept at his departure there, 
And waked to find my blister-plasters gone, 

To find me still to pa's estate tlie lieir, 
To find a taste for tea-and-toast well done. 

Tlie days that followed — they were all alike — 

All hapi)y as first days in paradise; 
Towards the sea of sorrows stood a dyke; 

The sky was bine, the winds as still as mice. 

One afternoon it chanced I sat alone: 

^^oine wine was making vineyards in my brain : 

Like tendrils were my thoughts, and curled, I owni, 
Wirh link? enough, but no connected chain. 

The Doctor was announced — tliat solemn man, 
Who never laughs, as he would have to rue it ; 

Who knows so much, and yet who seldom can 
Make known what ails you, or he doesn't do it. 

He took a seat, removed n glove and felt 

My slender wrist ; then ordered out my tongue; 

Bent nearer — scanned — looked cheerful—smelt — 

"Wine? After meals. Eat well, my son ':"' (Still young!) 

Eternal adolescence may be sw^et 

To those whom age makes hideous, gouty, lorn : 
'Vo vie it were a curse, unmixed, com})lete: 

'Twere better, surely, I had ne'er been l)orn. 

'T wish to ask you, Doctor, if you think 

I e'er shall be of age,'' said I with force. 
"Why, yes, this thing is but a passing kink; 

Your thread of life will now run straight, of course.'' 



14 THE DOCTOR. 



''But I am five-and-twentij now^'^ I cried. 

"0, voirll get well ; don't wander so in mind.'' 
And then the luird old man leaned back and sighed. ^ — 

Perhaps his style was wise, yet 'twas unkind. 

My thin lips trembled, and my eyes grew red; 

A mighty rage bnrned hot within my breast; 
His pitying gaze but made it worse, and fed 

'I'he inner warrior, till he showed his crest. 

I tried to gulp tlie rising dose, yet couldn't. 

'Twas well, for it would only Kill, not cure. 
"You think you're talking with a fool, but shouldn'l ! 

If I'm a babe, Til deal you wisdom pure 

"How^ many human creatures have you sent 
To their long home?" I roughly on liim fell. 

"How oft the veil of life's fine temple rent 

With clumsy, reckless, drug-smeared hand, O, tell I 

"How oft have seen the trusting being smile. 

While you pre})ared the draught of lingering death ? 

Have you done this as one quite free of guile — 
Thus trifled, bungled, till the latest breath ?" 

"Pray take a pinch," he begged, with box held out. 

"Twill do you good, your nose needs tickling, James. 
Is't possible you took for dinner kraut 'i 

That herb, fermenting, genders rpieerish flames." 

On that same line I stuck, and cpiickly said : 
"You doctors, by your cuttings, learn too much. 

You lose res})ect for life — prefer men dead ; 

Foi' while thev breathe thev kick at knives and such. 



THE DOCTOH. 15 



''You're learned mosqiiitos, sent to curse the race. 

You know full well with hypodermic tiirust 
To bring the hapless victim face to face 

With the dread Archer — thence to worms ami dust!' 

"Dear James, I have a lozenge in my pocket 
That soon would rid you of this gastric load ; 

Your head, I fear, will get quite out of socket: 
The self-cut vein too long, I think, has flowed." 

''You give that lozenge to the next poor dog! 

I'm sure I hear him bark. He w^aits, perchance. 
You think I see things wrong side up in fog, 

A:;d charge an insect with a Quixote's lance. 

''But 1 do know too well of what 1 speak : 

Your conscience, blistered once, would tell you so. 

If I have mixed the dose not over weak, 

'Tis layman's tit for doctor's tat^ you know.'' 

I saw^ that I, at last, had punctured him ; 

And that did sate the raving inner beast. 
He rose and went, and shut the door with vim, 

And wandered hence, a madder man, at least. 



16 BROTHER JONATHAX AND HIS YOUNGEST. 



Cr 



VI. 

BROTHER JON^ATHAIS^ AND HIS YOUIS'GEST* 

^OR seven long years he fought a losing tight; 
(y\ Yet, being stubborn, worried out the other, 
And gained the day, or, rather, gained the nigJtt^ 
And fat J. B. beheld a long, lank Brother. 

I'his Brother swore by stars and stripes, and sang 
A simple air, or breathed it as a whistle; 

And round the whole great world the ditty rang, 
And seemed a Gospel, like a new Epistle. 

The slender formed Relation took to guessing 
Columbia's riddle, put to craze and scare; 

And Avith the thumb the nasal organ pressing, 
He waved the fingers lightly in the air. 

He guessed it, and behold the endless treasures 
Heaped by the Sphinx, t/expvess her admiration ! 

At first in pecks, and then in bushel measures. 
Until the mass became an aggravation. 



BROTHER JONATHAN AND HIS YOUNGEST. 17 



Surprised at her own wealth, tlie Sphinx grew warm. 
And changed from stone into a lovely being, 

And pleased the Brother with tlie lath -like form : 
He married her, she modestly agreeing. 

And soon a most mixed family was seen : 
Of statesmen scores, of poets many a dozen ; 

Of orators ten thousand, ripe and green, 

Aiid editors unnumbered, chance and chosen. 

At last, there came a mystic, wondrous birth, 
A bright- eyed troup, that took to reading law — 

To verbal fencing and designing mirth — 
To softly gloving what were else a paw I 

They smiled on all — a galaxy of rays I 

By day they slept, or trimmed their claws for fight, 
Or wrought their darts in crypts and hidden ways. — 

Like Friedland's star, they shone the best at night. 

When to some corner rushed an eager throng. 

And gathered round the rough hewn stage to hear 

Soft, lying words that made the right seem wrong, 
And tainted tales that roused the mighty cheer, 

Then, they were there, and chanted many a ditty, 
Or roared in braying tones that cheated none ; 

Or lied old lies that in their time were witty: 
Did other things that numerous flies had blown. 

And in the caucus, plotting deep and sly! — 
This was the chosen, pretty, flowery field : 

How swift the pigeon-pinioned hours did fly ! 

How swift the growth — how rank the baleful yield! 



18 BIJOTHEH JONATHAX AND HIS YOUXGEST. 



They worked for fnn ? No, for their nation's good. 

Brave patriots seeking for their country's altar, 
Or for some breach where only heroes stood, 

That they might show how bold men never falter. 

They found this altar — under various names: 
Post-oflBce, Custom-house, and Foreign Mission. 

They found the breach to be a Court of Claims : 
Most happy was their native intuition ! 

Not finding such, they freely made the breaclies, 
And with as brave devotion fired away ! 

They even served as very hungry leeches, 
To rid their country of its plethora. 

This later growth still lives and multiplies. 
I meet them often in my pilgrimage ; 

And now and then I pierce their soft disguise- 
Strip off the dignity that them doth hedge ; 

Yet shrink afflicted from the nameless sight. 
And turn away to other, lighter themes. 

Content to leave them in this shocking plight, 
Which might be w^orse, yet is what here it seems. 



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